Sixth Grader Wins Spelling Bee

How do you spell “victory”? For Gokul Venkatachalam, it was “b-r-u-s-c-h-e-t-t-a.” The 12-year-old Parkway West Middle School student from Chesterfield, Mo., defended his title to win the 2013 St. Louis Post-Dispatch Regional Spelling Bee for a second straight year. McKendree University hosted the area’s best spellers on two consecutive weekends. Winners of the written semi-finals held on March 2 advanced to the finals on March 9 at the Hettenhausen Center for the Arts.

Gokul represented the St. Louis region in the Scripps National Spelling Bee in Washington, D.C. in late May and earned a spot in the semifinals. The University will host the Spelling Bee next year on March 1, 2014.